Friday, March 22, 2024 (Court Day #640)

It was a chilly morning, overcast and 54°F. I fly out early tomorrow morning to head to New Orleans for a trade show and won’t be back until late Wednesday night.

Tennis Elbow?

I’ve been playing more in the last two weeks than I have played in a two weeks period in the past nine months. That is helping me regain my skills. A bit concerning, however, is I have very slight tennis elbow symptoms with very slight soreness in my forearm plus a little bit of soreness when I make certain motions where the two bones meet at my elbow. Hopefully, that won’t develop into anything more serious.

Departure

I left my house at 8:50 a.m., after checking in for my Southwest Airlines flight. Southwest has open boarding, so the earliest you can check in, the better. Even checking in within 30 seconds of the start time, I completely missed the “A group” and end up being assigned B-35. I should still get a reasonable seat with that though.

Brommer

This morning at Brommer Park, it was club play, so it was very organized however I wasn’t be able to stay for the whole session. I had to get home and shower, run my mother-in-law—who is in town—to a tax appointment, and then I had to get out near 41st Avenue for a radio interview on the Think Local First program . . . it’s a chance to promote our family business for free.

Warm Up

When I arrived only half of the courts were full so I warmed up with a regular named Mike T. who sports a white beard. Mike solid 3.5 level player.

During my warm-up with Mike, I was hitting a lot of my drop shots into the white tape. I have some work to do on that. I need to think about where I want the ball to land, not what the ball has to clear or I need to think about a space a foot above the net instead of the net itself. The good news is I nailed—by far—most of my drop shots in actual games.

Games

Mike and I played game against Patty and Gregg, the left-handed player. Well, Patty and Gregg came back to make a game of it, Mike and I still won. Gregg was the weakest player and I was playing very well.

After the first game when Mike and I beat Patty and Gregg, when it came time to sign up for our next game, Patty said “I want to play with you. You know how to play the game.“ That was a nice compliment. She is saying that my game is not one dimensional, She’s complaining about some players: drive, drive, lob. Drive, drive, lob. Drive, drive, lob. And they have no soft game. My game is well-rounded.

Busy

There were some long waits today and court time was at a premium. The clouds are burned off and it got to be pretty nice. The rain was expected later today.

I got into a game with Patty against Leslie and Dan Bliss. This was an all OG game. I definitely wanted to play well in this game—honestly, I felt little anxious—and I did. Patty and I won handily.

My last game of the day was also with Leslie and Dan. We had signed up in blue. My partner would be Mike T. who also signed up in blue. I was a bit surprised if he had done that but that would be the game. (Maybe Mike was having an off day, I don’t play with him enough to know.) Mike was the weakest player on the court. Leslie and Dan won pretty easily but I played well and they complimented my play after the game.

I did miss one of my serves today, but for that one serve that I missed, I had four or five that were returned by the receivers into the net.

I got to my backpack after the last game and checked the time. 11:06 a.m. It was time to boogie.

Radio

I got home, showered, dropped my mother-in-law at her appointment, then I headed out to the studio for the SantaCruzVoice‘s Think Local First radio show. The show features local businesses which are members of Think Local First, a local collective that promotes supporting independent local shops.

The show was originally on KSCO, but when the owner laid off nearly all their staff in favor of mostly syndicated programming, the now-unemployed crew started their own internet radio station. I don’t know their listenership, but appearing on the program is low cost—just my time and gas—and I’m comfortable in a radio studio (I’ve been interviewed maybe half a dozen times on various programs), so there wasn’t much to lose.

While the program went live at 1:06 p.m., I was there about 15-20 minutes early and I ended up sharing thoughts on air while Susan O’Connor Fraser and her husband wrapped up their previous program, Noon Balloon – Eat. Drink. And Be Local. They were talking about the Giant Dipper roller coaster at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk and I told them that my uncle had designed the coaster’s sign that’s been hanging there for many decades. And that my great-grandfather had done the concrete work for the carousel there as well. Then we went into the break—national news time and ads.

My view from the radio studio. Not as fancy as KSCO, but does the job!

I felt the nearly hour-long show went really well. It certainly went quickly. Afterward, we said our goodbyes and I made my way to “work work”!

Number of days on a court: 640
Number of total hours: 2,760
Number of paid coaching hours: 24.5

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